While at work one morning, I received a call from my friend and she sounded very upset. She was crying and asked me if I could come over. I explained to her that I was busy at work and would be able to come over afterwards. She was really upset and pleaded with me to come over. I tell her that I will try to work something out to leave work early. I managed to conjure up a story to my boss about my daughter being sick and that I needed to take her to the doctor. I was able to leave work early and was on my way to go comfort my friend.

When I arrive at her house, I notice that she is dressed very professionally and her eye liner is smudged due to the constant stream of tears rolling down her face. I give her a hug and ask her what happened. She walks me into her living room and we sit on her leather couch. My friend tells me that she needs to tell me something, but is afraid of how I will react. Oh great, here we go again. What was she planning on telling me? I told her that she can tell me anything and that I would have an open mind.

My friend takes a deep breath and looks into my eyes. She starts telling me about her husband and how he would go on trips to Germany for work. He would be gone for weeks at a time, but when he returned he always surprised her with elaborate gifts. She explained that she never had to worry about money because it seemed like her husband was doing really well in his career. They have this nice house, fancy cars, a beautiful lake house with a boat and they belonged to a nice country club.

But six months ago, she found out that he had been embezzling money from his company. With the help of the company’s CFO, her husband had managed to steal almost two million dollars from his employer. When his company finally started putting the pieces together, he decided to end his life. The morning that he ended his life, he left her a note explaining what he had done over the years. My friend told me that for the seven years that she was married, it had all been one big lie. He didn’t make the money she thought he did, he had been stealing from his company to make it appear as if he was successful.

I was in shock. How did this guy that I remembered being a stellar student in college and always the teacher’s aide, not think about how his actions would affect his family? She started explaining that the reason why she was dressed up was because she had been in court. Over the past six months, she had been meeting with her attorney and her husband’s company to work out a deal for them to recover the money that was stolen from them. On top of dealing with that, she had been waiting to hear from their life insurance company to see if she would receive payment since her husband committed suicide.

Fortunately, her attorney was able to keep her out of trouble since she was unaware of what her husband had done. She told me that she agreed to sign over the lake house, boat, Porsche and the other BMW to the company so that the company could sell the items in order to help recover some of their loss. She was devastated because she loved the lake house and boat because of the memories she had going down there with friends and family. Her attorney was also able to make sure that my friend and her kids could stay in their home since it was purchased before her husband started working for this company. She had hoped that this would be it and that her husband’s company would be satisfied with this decision so that she could move on with her life. However, her main concern was whether she would receive any of the life insurance money. She was worried how she would provide for her children.

Later on that week, I was invited over to my friend’s house for dinner. As soon as I walked into her house, I am greeted with a big hug and my friend said “Guess What?” She is glowing and I can tell that she is busting to tell me some good news. She screams out, “I’m getting paid from the life insurance!” My friend would be getting a million dollars from the life insurance. She could now relax and take care of her kids. I asked her whether her husband’s company could come after the money and she said that they would not since they had finalized the deal for her to sign over the other items. Before I know it, my friend hands me a glass of champagne and the stress that she was feeling earlier in the week had disappeared.

After dinner, my friend looks at me and tells me that she wants me to help her enjoy this new money. I ask her what she means, so she starts telling about trips that she wants to take and items that she wants to buy. I told her that it all sounds nice and that I would be willing to go on any trip with her. Then out of the blue, she tells me that she wants to transition our friendship into a dating relationship. I explain to her that I am concerned with her still dealing with the loss of her husband. She looks at me and tells me again about felling she had lived a lie the past seven years. According to her, she was ready to move on and wanted to be with me. Before I knew it, we were embraced in our first kiss. After the kiss, I felt a little strange, possibly guilty. All kinds of thoughts were running through my mind. What had I done? Was this the right thing to do?

To be continued…Stay tuned for the final part of this dating experience